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My team and I are encountering our first robot build.......a heavyweight. So were making it easy on ourselves.
We're pretty set on an invertible ram/wedge 4wd defensive bot.

Definitely a NOOB.

Being a welder/fabricator my task is to ensure we have a chassis that wont be ripped to shreds on our first encounter with a spinner.
initial thoughts when first approached were 6-8mm thick mild steel plate. However after re watching the last series of robot wars everyone was using hardox (I'd never heard of it)
I was planning a complete monocoque chassis (inc. wedge) fully welded with chamfers on each side of the wedge to minimise being struck at a hard right angle.
Basically is this possible to achieve in mild steel or is it a must, with spinners around like carbide, that hardox is used.

I think you can use mild steel if you want, but I wouldn't expect it to last long against the big spinners of today. Then again, not much does. It's fine for internal structures like bulkheads, but honestly I think you're best going for Hardox on the outside, unless you plan on doing a Hypershock and just avoiding hits on your armour.

No offence intended, but I think 8mm angled is a bit overboard. Maybe if you're intending on getting hit all over, but nobody uses 8mm everywhere. Terrorhurz' wedge was 6mm I believe, and that bounced hits away just fine until it got pried up by Aftershock from underneath, after having been on the flipper. I know Battlebots is a fundamentally different environment to Robot Wars, but you have bots there with much lighter armour, and I can't imagine stinger's front blade is that thick either. I think you can get around using thinner stuff if you play to your strengths. Carbide has 5mm Hardox around the edge to my knowledge, though it's fair to say they rarely get hit.

It's a case-by-case thing though isn't it? How was the armox mounted? Was it at an angle like a wedge? Where did the spinner catch? We've seen Tombstone break its blade in half on Witch Doctor's shock-mounted front scoop, and then there's stuff like Gabriel which just ignores spinners for the most-part. It almost feels like you're better sacrificing armour thickness for maneuverability​ and weapon effectiveness when most armour just gets torn through anyway. Pulsar manages an 8mm front and back because it's so small, but are there any heavyweights that have 8mm on all sides?